What does Sûzat mean? Lord of the Rings location explanation

Rings of Power just mentioned one of the most important and beloved locations in Middle-earth – but even if you’re a die-hard Lord of the Rings fan, you may not know what Sûzat means.

In Season 1, the Harfoots live in Rhovanion, east of the Misty Mountains. Unlike the Hobbits of The Lord of the Rings, they are nomadic by nature; packing up and moving to another place is part of their routine.

But what Is unnatural leaves the orbit of their Harfoot companions, and that’s exactly what Poppy and Nori did with the Stranger in Rings of Power Season 2. In Episode 4, after being separated by a tornado, they make contact for the first time with another kind of hobbit on screen: the Stoors.

They visit their village, carved into the desert of Rhûn, and learn of a prophecy concerning a specific place: Sûzat.

Sûzat is another name for Shire

According to Gundabel, the former leader of the Stoors set out to find Sûzat is another name for the Shire, the home of the hobbits in The Lord of the Rings.

New linear cinema

When Poppy and Nori mention Sadoc Burrows, the clan leader who died in Season 1, Gundabel recognizes the name. It turns out he was a descendant of the Stoors, and the earlier leader was trying to find a place “with endless streams of cold water and rolling hills so soft a family could dig a hole and live in it in less than a month… he named it Sûzat.”

You may have already picked up on this from context, but it’s just another name for the Shire, derived from the Rohirric language. In Sindarin it’s also known as “i Drann”.

Where is the Shire?

The Shire is a county in Eriador.stretching for about 120 miles from the Far Downs in the west to the Brandywine Bridge in the east, and 150 miles from the northern moors to the marshes in the south. According to Tolkien, this is about 18,000 square miles in total.

New linear cinema

Remember, Hobbiton is just a village in the Shire, but the region is vast. It was originally divided into the four Farthings, until Buckland and Westmarch were made part of the area after the War of the Ring in the Third Age.

Interestingly, in Tolkien’s work, the Harfoots are the first to migrate west into Eriador from the Vales of Anduin. This begins the Days of the Hobbits’ Wanderings, a period of transit through the early Third Age.

Will we see the Shire in Rings of Power?

It’s highly unlikely that we’ll see the Shire in Rings of Power, given that the series is set in the Second Age and the region isn’t colonized until the Third Age.

More specifically, the Shire was settled by the Harfoots in TE 1601. Before they came to the Shire, they lived in Cardolan and Rhudar (there are even rumors that they fled the shadow of Dol Guldur).

The series is expected to end with Isildur losing the One Ring in Anduin, which will occur very early in the Third Age, long before the Harfoots approach the Shire.

Be sure to check out our recaps of Rings of Power Episodes 1, 2, and 3. Read our predictions for the identity of the Dark Witch King, and check out our guides on Círdan, Forodwaith, and whether or not The Rings of Power are considered canon within The Lord of the Rings.